Spring Break
It's Time To Stop The 'Skinny Sweepstakes'
Allyssa Milan
Issue date: 6/9/08 Section: Commentary
Recently, Psychology Today published an article titled "The Skinny Sweepstakes." It addressed the competition between women who strive to be considered more physically attractive than the rest. The article talks about how these competitive behaviors, ingrained at a young age and continuing into adulthood, have led to an eating disorder epidemic, especially on college campuses. The competition we face in our daily lives should help us grow by challenging us. Instead, competition seems to be hindering our growth as individuals. Our behaviors have become extremely unhealthy for the mind, body and spirit.
According to the article, dieting is "a competitive sport with a gold medal going to the thinnest, a triumph of the cultural ideal for appearance that almost every American girl will unwittingly internalize by middle school."
This is an alarming call for a reevaluation of, and more discourse on, the root of problems like eating disorders, which inevitably result from broken self-esteem. Our cultural norms and values are causing people to be at war with their appearances, and at war with each other over whose appearance is superior. What needs to be addressed even more is the fact that these battles begin so early for far too many people.
In elementary school, we are too busy sharing crayons and spreading cooties, but once middle school hits, for most people, the happy world we once lived in becomes vicious, small and judgmental - a microcosm of what we will likely face once we are released into the so-called "real world."
During those tender teenage years, our bodies are changing rapidly, our hormones and emotions are going hay-wire, and we are beginning to taste a more mature social life. It is then that we also first become much more aware of popular culture and how we are supposed to fit within it. It becomes a part of our daily lives. Advertisers even seem to target teenagers more than any other age group. Everywhere, we are bombarded with images of the "ideal" body type, products we need to look and feel our best and clothes we should buy in order to feel better about ourselves. The way we acclimate ourselves into society is quite literally by buying our way into asystem that seems to hurt us more than it helps.
According to the article, dieting is "a competitive sport with a gold medal going to the thinnest, a triumph of the cultural ideal for appearance that almost every American girl will unwittingly internalize by middle school."
This is an alarming call for a reevaluation of, and more discourse on, the root of problems like eating disorders, which inevitably result from broken self-esteem. Our cultural norms and values are causing people to be at war with their appearances, and at war with each other over whose appearance is superior. What needs to be addressed even more is the fact that these battles begin so early for far too many people.
In elementary school, we are too busy sharing crayons and spreading cooties, but once middle school hits, for most people, the happy world we once lived in becomes vicious, small and judgmental - a microcosm of what we will likely face once we are released into the so-called "real world."
During those tender teenage years, our bodies are changing rapidly, our hormones and emotions are going hay-wire, and we are beginning to taste a more mature social life. It is then that we also first become much more aware of popular culture and how we are supposed to fit within it. It becomes a part of our daily lives. Advertisers even seem to target teenagers more than any other age group. Everywhere, we are bombarded with images of the "ideal" body type, products we need to look and feel our best and clothes we should buy in order to feel better about ourselves. The way we acclimate ourselves into society is quite literally by buying our way into asystem that seems to hurt us more than it helps.
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